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We used to make them every time we went camping when I was a kid, and we camped quite often. Nothing beats cooking a mountain pie over the hot coals of an aging campfire. We generally make pizza ones, and we have made Reuben ones, and you have your standard pie-filling from a can/powdered sugar on top ones… but other than that I haven’t gotten too crazy. One time I did make a baked bean one. I mean, why not? Also, once we put leftover nine-can vegetable soup in an electric sandwich maker that we got on clearance from Kmart for $5. So, that is sort of similar to making a mountain pie. I mean, it would have made a good one.

Look at those crimped edges!

You gotta use a cast iron pie iron though, not those goofy aluminum ones. I have melted many an aluminum pie iron. I make those coals blacksmith hot. Also, you need one that seals the edges. The ones that don’t make a seal are just sandwich-heater-uppers and that’s bogus. I know they also make round ones where you can cook an egg and make an Egg McMuffin-ish type of sandwich.

My wife & I counsel for church camp every summer, and my camp always makes mountain pies… a tradition my family brought to our camp group when I was younger. Usually my friend Laurel & I end up being the cooks, over a fire in a pavilion fireplace that rivals the fury of Mount Doom of Mordor.

Some of the campers have made cool ones with Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. I need to try that. (Side note: have you ever had a campfire banana? Do it!) An old preacher friend of ours enjoys one filled with butter & powdered sugar. I bet it’s like a donut.

Moutain Pielander? THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE! #MountainPieMadness

So, what are your go-to mountain pie recipes? I hear some people also call them hobo pies, pudgy pies, campfire pies, jaffle pies, and other crazy stuff. They have to rank up there right behind hot dogs and s’mores as the #1 campfire food. I have thought a cheesesteak one would be delicious, maybe an Italian Sub on, maybe a burger melt/’Frisco burger kind of thing, maybe one with baked beans and a sliced hot dog would be the ultimate campfire mashup? You could go with a classic grilled cheese.

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So, did you read my last post about making a playlist of Metallica songs so Bethany will be familiar with some of the music at the show? l grabbed a few tracks from each album, popped them into a list, & mixed ’em up a bit. It still seems a tad unwieldy. It’s 47 songs, and I don’t even want to know what the run time would be. (I still need to dig out all of my CD’s & rip some of these older songs. I live in the stone age and listen to mp3’s saved to a thumb drive plugged into the car.)

How would you pare it down? Could you get it to 30 songs? 10 songs? 60 minutes? What is the most essential stuff you’d need to grasp their overall sound and/or appreciate a live show?

I had Alexa playing some random Metallica this morning, and it wasn’t a bad mix. This actually really has me appreciating Death Magnetic & Hardwired… To Self-Destruct more & more.

Metallica 101 Playlist…

“Ecstasy of Gold” (We All Love Ennio Morricone) [Ennio Morricone]

“Enter Sandman” (Metallica)

“One” (…And Justice for All)

“For Whom the Bell Tolls” (Ride the Lightning)

“Whiskey in the Jar” (Garage, Inc.) [Thin Lizzy]

“(Anesthesia)—Pulling Teeth” (Kill ‘Em All)

“Whiplash” (Kill ‘Em All)

“Last Caress” (Live Shit: Binge & Purge) [Misfits]

“Master of Puppets” (Master of Puppets)

“Cyanide” (Death Magnetic)

“The Call of Ktulu” (S&M)

“Nothing Else Matters” (Metallica)

“Seek And Destroy” (Live Shit: Binge & Purge)

“Some Kind of Monster” (St. Anger)

“Fade To Black” (Ride the Lightning)

“Overkill” (Garage, Inc.) [Motörhead]

“Hardwired” (Hardwired… To Self-Destruct)

“The Memory Remains” (Through The Never)

“Four Horsemen” (Kill ‘Em All)

“Creeping Death” (Live Shit: Binge & Purge)

“Until It Sleeps” (S&M)

“Altas, Rise!” (Hardwired… To Self-Destruct)

“Battery” (Master of Puppets)

“Die, Die My Darling” (Garage, Inc.) [Misfits]

“Frantic” (St. Anger)

“Fuel” (Re-Load)

“Orion” (Through the Never)

“Unforgiven” (Metallica)

“Unforgiven II” (Re-Load)

“Unforgiven III” (Death Magnetic)

“Sad But True” (Live Shit: Binge & Purge)

“I Disappear” (Mission: Impossible 2 Soundtrack)

“All Nightmare Long” (Death Magnetic)

“Mama Said” (Load)

“Welcome Home (Sanitarium)” (Master of Puppets)

“Commando” (St. Anger Single) [Ramones]

“Now That We’re Dead” (Hardwired… To Self-Destruct)

“Stone Cold Crazy” (Garage, Inc.) [Queen]

“Wherever I May Roam” (S&M)

“The Day That Never Comes” (Death Magnetic)

“Tuesday’s Gone” (Garage, Inc.) [Lynyrd Skynyrd]

“Disposable Heroes” (Master of Puppets)

“Blackened” (…And Justice for All)

“St. Anger” (St. Anger)

“Low Man’s Lyric” (Re-Load)

“Harvester of Sorrow” (…And Justice for All)

“One” (S&M)

Would you skip songs & go to videos, live sets or clips, or documentaries?

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So, Bethany is awesome and got us tickets to go see Metallica when they come to Pittsburgh in October. We don’t have a whole lot of overlap in musical taste. We have been to a bunch of concerts together, ranging from Flogging Molly, Rancid, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, & the Dropkick Murphys, to Willie Nelson, The Devil Makes Three, Poison & even (Lord help me) Kenny Chesney. This doesn’t even count the dozens (hundreds?) of club shows we have attended for the local and national levels back when I was actively gigging… which was mostly punk or metal stuff on a more local-ish level like Omegalord and Peelander-Z. I think I have successfully sold Bethany on the awesomeness of punk rock. We haven’t really delved into metal past what I have played in the car. Even myself, I have gravitated more in the punk direction than metal listening over the years. Perhaps due to a shrinking attention span? Metallica stands as one of those influential bands for me as far as it being one of the earlier things I “got.” A kid in 6th grade lent me his cassette of …And Justice for All, and it was all-in from there. It led me to stuff like the Misfits, Danzig, Megadeth, Motörhead, & Black Sabbath. I wore out multiple copies of the Master of Puppets cassette. The black album is a hugely definitive and divisive album, but it hit right when I was headed into high school, metal ruled the airwaves and guitar magazines, and grunge hadn’t yet stomped all over the oft-mocked hair metal’s reign supreme. A Year and a Half in the Life of Metallica and Live Shit: Binge & Purge made me want to be a rock star. My aunt & uncle took a me and a friend to the Guns N’ Roses & Metallica concert at Three Rivers Stadium. That was the first and only time I ever saw them live. It was my two favorite bands at the time. It was awesome. I’m anxious to go again.

If you were going to make a mix tape playlist as an introduction to Metallica, what would you include? Jokes about St. Anger or Load/Re-Load aside, what is the important stuff? Audio? Video? Live performances? Documentaries? Metallica covering their influences? Other bands covering Metallica? Related bands? Originals that Metallica has covered? What videos would you say are essential? MTV Icon? Behind the Music? When Metallica Ruled the World? I know “One” is up there in my all-time favorite songs. Do I start there, or go in chronological order? Which instrumentals?

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This morning I felt like playing the guitar. I didn’t feel like jamming in the basement by my work bench where all my stuff is set up. I didn’t bring up the Laney 2×12 or the Orange Micro Terror. I brought out the Fender Blues Jr. & a Yamaha MSR100 powered speaker so I could run my new DigiTech Trio into two different outputs.

The Trio was a birthday present from my wife. It was on backorder from Sweetwater for a while & we have been really busy so this was my first chance to try it out. I set it up like this…

It started out as a pile of stuff in the corner. Then I remembered that I had an old RCA-Victor TV cabinet in the garage purchased from our house’s previous owner that I thought about turning into an amp someday. The Blues Jr. fit where the TV went, and the Yamaha PA fit underneath where the speaker grille is.

Then I had a cabinet and I pile of pedals. So, I cut up a milk crate and made a goofy pedal board with a Donner power supply & some zip ties. The “board” fits inside the cabinet with the blues Jr. too. It was a morning long project but it felt good to get it done & know I can jam a lot more easily. It may be tricky if I just want to use the Trio & some headphones.

I do have a Dirt & Ernie pedal & an A/B/Y that I use to run the Jr. & Micro Terror at the same time. Maybe a board extension will eventually be in order? How cool would it be if the doors came off & were the pedalboard?

Oh well. Enough monkeying. Time to jam.

I will eventually have to give a serious(?) evaluation of the Trio. I do already know I want a looper now. Ha ha. It was pretty intuitive & loads of right out of the box. My 4 year old told me to turn it down right away, so it had to be cool. Right?

Monkeying with the DigiTech Trio:

I apologize for the “living room while the wife and kids are home” volume, and the Crocs.

My little dude seemed to like the idea. He has all the moves down. Maybe some day he will want to play too!

Do you have a living room, bedroom, or other small setup rig? Share some in the comments! Any thoughts on any of this equipment? Any tips for the Trio? You can comment below here at the blog with WordPress, Facebook, Twitter, or a Gravatar login.

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Did you see part 1? I quickly realized I like a vast odd selection of Christmas music. There are so many I dig that didn’t make the cut, and I’m sure ones I forgot. Throw me your favorites in the comments!

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I have been trying to post a Christmas song per day since the beginning of December. I think I make a new YouTube playlist every year. (I must have set YouTube to tweet when I add videos to playlists way back… because it seems to be doing that with the stuff I’m adding.)

I enjoy some Christmas albums, but seem to have found a bunch of random songs that I like over the years. Some traditional, some quite the opposite. Here’s the first batch. There is no rhyme or reason or favorite order or anything.

Post some of your favorite Winter Holiday songs in the comments. Links to videos, album names, artists, etc. Show me what you dig!